Napa County Sheriff | Drones
The Sheriff's drone policy sets a 180-day cap on keeping images of identifiable people, promises an annual public summary of flights, and bars weaponisation and random surveillance. The inventory section of the office's military equipment policy is an unfilled template.
At a glance
- Retention of images of identifiable people
- Not more than 180 days unless an exception applies [1]
- How that time is structured
- Treated as contemporaneous observation for 30 days, then moved to county storage, then deleted after as little as 120 days and no more than five years [1]
- Weapons
- The policy states the system shall not be weaponised [1]
- Random surveillance
- Prohibited, along with targeting people by characteristics such as race, religion or gender identity [1]
- Privacy
- Absent a warrant or exigent circumstances, operators shall not intentionally record where a person has a reasonable expectation of privacy [1]
- Public reporting
- An annual general summary of the previous year of operations should be released [1]
- Who authorises a flight
- The UAS Coordinator, a designee, or an office administrator [1]
How it happened
- Context
Atlas snapshot records drones in use
The EFF Atlas of Surveillance records the office operating DJI drones as of 2024. The row gives no count. [2]
- Context
Policy manual carries an April 2024 stamp
The manual posted on the county website carries a Lexipol copyright stamp of April 25, 2024. Policy 606 governs drone use and Policy 704 covers military equipment, which under state law includes unmanned aerial vehicles. [1]
What the policy establishes
Policy 606 of the Sheriff’s manual governs unmanned aerial systems. It is more specific about retention than most drone policies we have read. Information containing personally identifiable information “shall not be retained for more than 180 days” unless an exception applies, and the policy stages what happens inside that window: for the first thirty days the material “should be treated like any other contemporaneous or near contemporaneous observation”, after which it “should be moved to the Napa County Storage Area Network (SAN) and only accessed by authorized personnel”, and then deleted “so that the government does not maintain a long-term archive of information about individuals”, after a period “as short as 120 days” and no “longer than five years”.[1]
The prohibited uses are listed plainly. The equipment shall not be used “to conduct random surveillance activities”, nor to target a person “based solely on actual or perceived characteristics, such as race, ethnicity, national origin, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity or expression, economic status, age, cultural group, or disability”, nor to harass or intimidate, nor for personal business. The policy adds a single sentence: “The UAS shall not be weaponized.”[1]
On privacy, the policy says that absent a warrant or exigent circumstances operators “shall not intentionally record or transmit images of any location where a person would have a reasonable expectation of privacy (e.g., residence, yard, enclosure)”.[1]
The policy also commits the office to publishing. Under public transparency it says that “on an annual basis a general summary of the Office’s UAS operations during the previous year should be released to the public”.[1]
What the record does not establish
We do not know how many aircraft the office has, or what models. California law requires agencies to adopt a military equipment policy and publish an inventory, and the definition of military equipment includes “unmanned, remotely piloted, powered aerial or ground vehicles”. The inventory section of the posted policy, 704.4, reads in full: “The following constitutes a list of qualifying equipment for the Office: [Insert attachment here]”.[1] That is the template’s placeholder text, in the document as published.
The same chapter records the office’s own view of the terminology: “While the Legislatures defines our equipment as military equipment, this Office defines this equipment as law enforcement equipment.”[1]
We did not find the annual summary of operations or an annual military equipment report, and we did not sweep the county site for them, so we make no claim that they do not exist.
Where to ask
Two documents are named by the office’s own policies and would answer most of this page: the annual summary of drone operations, and the military equipment inventory that belongs in the empty section of Policy 704. Both are ordinary records requests. State law also requires an annual community engagement meeting on military equipment, which is a place to ask in person. The Napa County Board of Supervisors takes public comment at its meetings.
Questions
- How long can the Sheriff's Office keep drone footage of me?
- Policy 606 says information containing personally identifiable information "shall not be retained for more than 180 days" unless it is needed for an authorised mission, covered by the federal Privacy Act, or required to be kept longer by law. Within that window the policy sets stages: contemporaneous observation for 30 days, then county storage, then deletion after as little as 120 days and no longer than five years. [1]
- Can the drones be armed?
- No. The policy states plainly that the system shall not be weaponised. [1]
- Can they fly over my yard?
- The policy says that absent a warrant or exigent circumstances, operators "shall not intentionally record or transmit images of any location where a person would have a reasonable expectation of privacy", giving a residence, yard or enclosure as examples, and that operators should take reasonable precautions to avoid doing so inadvertently. [1]
- How many drones does the office have?
- We do not know. State law requires agencies to publish a military equipment inventory, and unmanned aerial vehicles fall inside that definition. The inventory section of the posted policy contains the text "[Insert attachment here]" rather than a list. [1]
What we do not know
- The number and models of aircraft, which the posted inventory section does not list.
- Whether the annual summary of operations that Policy 606 describes has been published.
- How many flights the office has run, and for what purposes.
- Whether the office publishes the annual military equipment report Policy 704 requires.
What you can do
Show up
Systems like this one are approved by boards, councils and committees that meet in public. We have not yet confirmed where each of them meets in Napa County.
What we have documented in Napa County →Protect yourself
Practical steps to shrink your personal data trail. Our guides publish at launch; until then, EFF's Surveillance Self-Defense is the best starting point.
Surveillance Self-Defense →Sources
- 1. Napa County Sheriff's Office Policy Manual, Policy 606 (Unmanned Aerial System) and Policy 704 (Military Equipment) · Primary document · accessed · archived copy
- 2.
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